But this was afterward. The party started off from Hampton in high fettle and with a childlike trust in the honesty of a garage attendant.
There were banks of clouds shrouding the horizon both to the west and north—the two directions from which thunder showers usually rise in this part of New England in which they were traveling. And yet the shower held off.
It was some time past noon before the thunder began to mutter again. The automobile party was then in the hilly country. Heretofore farms had been plentiful, although hamlets were few and far between.
“If it rains,” said Ruth cheerfully, “of course we can take refuge in some farmhouse.”
“Ho, for adventure among the savage natives!” cried Helen.
“I hope we shall meet nobody quite as savage as Miss Susan Timmins,” was Aunt Kate’s comment.
They ran into a deep cut between two wooded hills and there was not a house in sight. Indeed, they had not passed a farmstead on the road for the last five miles. Over the top of the wooded crest to the north curled a slate colored storm cloud, its upper edge trembling with livid lightnings. The veriest tyro of a weather prophet could see that a storm was about to break. But nobody had foretold the sudden stopping of the honeymoon car in the lead!
“What is the matter with you?” cried Helen, standing up in the tonneau of the big car, when Tom pulled up suddenly to keep from running the maroon roadster down. “Don’t you see it is going to rain? We want to get somewhere.”
“I guess we have got somewhere,” responded Jennie Stone. “As far as we are concerned, this seems to be our stopping place. The old car won’t go.”
Tom jumped out and hurried forward to join Henri in an examination of the car’s mechanism.